I'm looking for some advice on how to possibly find my boat. I had just brought my boat to my parents house 1 week ago to finish instaling the new custom interior and to tune the motor for the upcoming season. I normally leave it at the marina a block away from their home, which is tightly secured. So I called my mom today on my way home from work to see how things were, and she asked if I had came by to pick up the boat today. I thought she was trying to joke, well jokes on me. Sometime between 8 am and 3 pm my boat went missing. The  part is my insurance expired a month prior. I figured I'd insure it just before I put it back in the water in a week, "what could happen?" What gets me is that its a good nahboorhood, and nobody said they heard or saw anything. I had a tongue lock on the trailer, but it proved to be usesless. Anyway if anybody see anything on the net please help out.

The boat is a grey & black 1989 Mastercraft Prostar 190. It has a 90% finished new custom interior(grey on grey), custom folding tower(similar to FCT), Automatic balast system, Rack and pinion stering with a Grant racing steering wheel ,on a sigle axle MC trailer. Curently there are no decals on the boat, no starter and the thevies forgot the Drivers seat base.

F those F'ing F'ers. Keep an eye on the boat ramps for a unatended boat. They probably would not check to see if there was a starter prior to going to the lake. Make sure it is reported stolen. I don't know about Canada, but stolen boats normaly come back, unless your in the US and you live near Mexico. Put a picture up on every boating website in Canada so people can keep an eye out.

call the border patrol asap. that boat is probably headed south... i have heard horror stories how some thieves can re-gel new vins in the back within a half hour and title a boat and trailer within the same day, then sell in the states. call your version of the dmv and have them keep a look out for a "mastercraft" and not a specific vin. because that boat is nowhere near your neighborhood right now. flyers, boat ramps, forget it. hit the highway mounties and neighboring provinces, someone is looking to cash in quick and knows what they are doing if it has only been at your parents for a week and was stolen... you need to be aggressive with the authorities or they will laugh at you for not having insurance. good luck mate...

I caught a guy ripping me off in Sacramento. I was traveling from San Diego to Seattle and thought I get some skiing in at Tahoe. I stopped to get my ski's tuned and while I was waiting, I watched a guy walk up to my car and smash out the passengers window, bend over and started to go thru my stuff, deciding what to steal. I walked over, and proceeded to dish out a bit of street justice, if you know what I mean. The cops showed up in a jiffy and I was just finishing his beating. Well the cops arrested me! The thief was pretty messed up, and was unable to explain his side of the story. After endless explaining, and a couple on onlookers story, I was released. This happened when I was in my 20's... (about a hundred years ago) I wouldn't try it now...but it sure felt good (and still does!) to dish out that whupping.

Randy, when I was 15 I was arrested in Tahoe City (Placer County jail) under suspicion of stealing a jet ski, they told me that there was a witness that saw me walking a 3 person jet ski on a trailer down the bike path to the nearest boat ramp (2miles). Those guys are ruthless, any way I was let go because they found the real thief. Sorry just brought back memories. I just thought it was funny that someone in broad daylight walked a stolen jet to the boat ramp.

Hey Giacome Bove... Just make sure someone like Fletch wouldnt play a joke on you! Call the police, have them patrol the border! It is the only place they will be able to get away with using a customized boat like yours.

Sorry to hear about your boat!

I guess that is no one ever tries to take a Yellow Koala! Who would ever want that!

We live near you, in the Lower Mainland. 2.5 years ago, we had our previous boat stolen from Captain's Cove marina. It was a 1996 Chapparral. It was stolen in October, just when we went to pick it up to pull it out of the water for the year. Surprise surprise, no boat.

The boat was found about 3 months after it was stolen. By then our insurance policy had already kicked in. They wanted to go down the path of getting it surveyed for damage, but we were like, no, give us our money.

Our boat was quite famous. It was part of a ring of theives who were stealing boats and then scratching off the VIN's and repainting and selling for dirt cheap. It's picture was in both local dailies, and some municipal weeklies. They interviewed the detective in charge of the case in front of our boat. When they talked about the VINs, they zoomed in the back of our boat and VIN!

Speaking of tongue locks, the trailer was at a storage facility while the boat was in the water. Part of the insurance settlement involved getting new keys for the tongue lock. The locksmith just went down to the storage place, drilled out the lock and put a new one in. Seems pretty simple if you have a drill!

Anyhow, I can't offer much help on finding your boat, other than hoping the detectives find it. We knew it was like looking for a needle in a haystack in terms of finding it in the Lower Mainland, or worse, somewhere further.

We also learned the value of insurance. Although ours was insured, not for nearly enough. But the bright side is that we ended up getting the boat we really wanted. If our boat hadn't been stolen, we'd probably still have the Chapparral, and have just done minor improvements to it.